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Better Artificial Intelligence (AI) Stock: CoreWeave vs. Nvidia

There will prove to be many winners as artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure continues to grow and AI end-uses expand. Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) has been the Wall Street darling surrounding everything AI for the past two years.

CoreWeave (NASDAQ: CRWV) has been getting the love most recently, though. Shares of the AI hyperscaler providing cloud services have soared about 185% in just the past month as of this writing. Nvidia stock has increased 24% in that time. CoreWeave just went public in late March, and the shares have jumped about 270% since that initial public offering (IPO). Investors may wonder if Nvidia's shine is fading, and it's time to buy CoreWeave instead. I'd argue that is flawed thinking, however.

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Lit up "AI" (artificial intelligence) on a purple chip highlighted on a circuit board.

Image source: Getty Images.

The growth isn't over for Nvidia

Investors may be taking a breather after the early exponential gains in Nvidia stock. Growth in the business itself has also slowed, though that was inevitable. Sales of its advanced chips in the data center segment had been growing like a weed. Revenue in that segment has been increasing in each consecutive quarter for the last two years. In the most recent fiscal quarter, that growth rate slowed to 10%, though, as seen below.

bar chart showing Nvidia data center revenue growth quarter-over-quarter for the last two years.

Data source: Nvidia. Chart by author.

Despite that trend, it's clear AI demand hasn't yet peaked. Remember, these are still sequential quarterly increases in data center sales. For perspective, that fiscal first-quarter revenue was a 73% jump compared to the prior year period. Management also guided investors to expect further revenue growth in the current quarter. So, while an unsustainable growth rate slows, the company is still solidly in growth mode.

Nvidia is more ubiquitous than you might think

That's because it's not just Nvidia's advanced GPU and CPU chips driving sales and expanding AI infrastructure. Its AI ecosystem includes interconnect technologies, the CUDA (compute unified device architecture) software platform, and artificial intelligence processors that are part of many different types of architectures.

CEO Jensen Huang recently touted Nintendo's new Switch 2 gaming console, for example. The unit includes Nvidia's AI processors that Huang claims "sharpen, animate, and enhance gameplay in real time."

Nvidia has a broad array of customers. As AI factories and data centers are built, it will continue to be a major supplier and one that investors should benefit from owning. Nvidia also invests in the AI sector. It makes sense to look at where the AI leader itself sees future gains.

Nvidia thinks CoreWeave is a good investment

One of the AI companies in which Nvidia holds a stake is CoreWeave. Nvidia should know CoreWeave well, too, as an important customer. CoreWeave leases data center space to companies needing the scalable, on-demand compute power it has control of from the 250,000 Nvidia chips it has purchased.

It's a desirable option for enterprises that require significant computational power to process large amounts of data efficiently. There appears to be plenty of demand. But there is plenty of risk for investors, too. It just announced a new lease agreement to further increase capacity.

Applied Digital, a builder and operator of purpose-built data centers, has agreed to deliver CoreWeave 250 megawatts (MW) of power load on a 15-year term lease at its recently built North Dakota data center campus. CoreWeave has the option to expand the load by an additional 150 MW in the future.

Demand is quickly driving growth for CoreWeave. That's led investors to jump in and drive the stock higher in recent months. Valuation is just one major risk with CoreWeave. Customer concentration is another. Last year, Microsoft accounted for nearly two-thirds of revenue. CoreWeave also disclosed that 77% of 2024 revenue came from just its top two customers.

CoreWeave is also spending massive amounts of capital to grow AI cloud capacity. It had about $5.4 billion of liquidity available as of March 31 and raised another $2 billion from a late May debt offering. That's approximately its level of capital expenditure in just the first quarter alone, though.

CoreWeave has the risk, Nvidia has the profits

That spending may pay off. But there are risks there as well. Customers could develop their own AI infrastructure or could redesign systems that don't require its services. CoreWeave stock also trades at a high valuation after the stock has soared. It recently had a price-to-sales (P/S) ratio of about 30.

That could be cut in half this year with its strong sales growth, but it isn't earning any money yet. At the same time, Nvidia sports a price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of about 30 based on this year's expected profits.

Remember, too, that as CoreWeave grows, so do Nvidia's profits. Applied Digital CEO Wes Cummins said that its leased North Dakota data center campus will be full of Nvidia Blackwell class servers. I think the risk profile, financial picture, and massive potential for Nvidia make it the better AI stock to buy now.

Should you invest $1,000 in Nvidia right now?

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Howard Smith has positions in Microsoft and Nvidia. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Microsoft and Nvidia. The Motley Fool recommends Nintendo and recommends the following options: long January 2026 $395 calls on Microsoft and short January 2026 $405 calls on Microsoft. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

My 3 Favorite Stocks to Buy Right Now

The last couple weeks of springtime have seen the market itself spring to life. There are investing opportunities in both stocks that have fallen out of favor and some popular growth stocks.

Some of my favorite stocks right now are Sirius XM Holdings (NASDAQ: SIRI), Nintendo (OTC: NTDOY), and Roku (NASDAQ: ROKU). They are well positioned to keep rising from here, armed with some obvious and some not-so-obvious bullish catalysts. Let's take a look.

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1. Sirius XM Holdings

Don't let the weak stock chart facade dissuade you from taking a closer look at the country's satellite radio monopoly. Sirius XM stock was cut in half last year, and it still hasn't bounced back in 2025. There are some solid reasons for the media stock's meandering ways, but there are also a compelling valuation, chunky yield, and potential tailwinds to consider.

Let's start with the negatives. It's been more than a decade since Sirius XM posted double-digit top-line growth, and revenue is now declining slightly for the third year in a row. Auto sales are the funnel that leads to new subscriptions, and that market has been weak. Young drivers are also turning to streaming smartphone apps for in-car entertainment, bypassing Sirius XM's premium offering. If this looks pretty bleak, turn the corner. Sirius XM may be about to do exactly that a lot sooner than the market thinks.

Folks enjoying a ride in a convertible with the top down.

Image source: Getty Images.

It was easy to see why Sirius XM was struggling coming out of the pandemic. Folks were working from home, so it was easy to justify sidestepping in-car subscriptions for a product that eases daily commutes. This is starting to change, with more and more companies calling employees back to the office. Gas prices are low, down 12% across the country over the past year and 22% lower than they were three years ago. This should be an incentive to get folks driving more, increasing the value proposition of coast-to-coast coverage of Sirius XM's premium content. Meanwhile, if financing rates start to ease up and the economic outlook improves, there's going to be a lot of pent-up demand for new vehicle sales with factory-installed Sirius XM satellite receivers.

The valuation is better than you might think for a company on the cusp of turning things around. You can buy Sirius XM stock for less than 8 times this year's projected earnings. If the recovery takes some time, it literally pays to be patient. The stock's 4.9% yield is a lot better than both the market average and what sideline sitters are generating in money market yields.

Don't take it from me, though. Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A) (NYSE: BRK.B) has boosted its stake three times since the fall of last year. Warren Buffett's holding company now owns more than a third of Sirius XM. I'm happy to own a much smaller chunk of the company.

2. Nintendo

Let's play a different game with this one. Nintendo isn't out of favor like Sirius XM. Shares of the Japanese video game pioneer hit another all-time high this month. The market is buzzing about next week's rollout of the Switch 2, Nintendo's first new gaming system in more than eight years.

This is a pretty big deal. Revenue and earnings for Nintendo tend to triple if not quadruple in the three to four years after a major new console comes out. The business itself is already well ahead of where Nintendo was when the original Switch hit the market in March of 2017. Nintendo's multigenerational appeal continues to widen. Nintendo has successfully jump-started its presence as a theatrical property, and it now has a presence with a dedicated land in three of the world's largest theme parks. Nintendo is richly priced based on recent financials, but the future is what is fueling renewed interest here. With demand for Switch 2 outstripping supply, the next couple of years should treat investors to stellar growth.

3. Roku

There's no sugarcoating the ugly multiyear stock chart here. Roku shares are trading 85% lower than their peak in the summer of 2021. That doesn't mean that Roku isn't in a much better place now. The company behind North America's leading operating system for TV streaming has never entertained an audience this large with engagement levels perpetually rising.

The 16% revenue growth it posted in its latest results extends its streak of double-digit gains to eight quarters. Losses continue to narrow, and Roku is forecasting a return to profitability in the second half of this year. With time spent on the platform having risen 16% over the past year, it has a firm hold on its viewers, who spend hours a day channeling their TV consumption through Roku's landing page. Its guidance for the second quarter did come in a bit light, but it's still stretched its streak of double-digit revenue growth to nine quarters.

Should you invest $1,000 in Sirius XM right now?

Before you buy stock in Sirius XM, consider this:

The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the 10 best stocks for investors to buy now… and Sirius XM wasn’t one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years.

Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you’d have $653,389!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you’d have $830,492!*

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*Stock Advisor returns as of May 19, 2025

Rick Munarriz has positions in Nintendo, Roku, and Sirius XM. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Berkshire Hathaway and Roku. The Motley Fool recommends Nintendo. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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